Today a group of eleven of us returned to Boltby for some extra-curricular excavation…and were rewarded by searing sunshine. After three weeks of almost unrelenting wind and rain it was an odd experience to be in a trench and warm. The remnants of Group J headed back over the wall to see what had happened to trench AK since Friday; there had certainly been some changes. The ditch is now even deeper, extending into the gryke, and the palisade has FINALLY been found!

The first thing that needed to be done was to photograph the beautifully cleaned trench for the purposes of creating a 3D image. Unfortunately the sun became something of an annoyance here as shadows really mess up a 3D photograph. The solution was to balance Gigi on top of the Landrover so he could get an uninterrupted and shadowless view of the trench. Archaeology, it seems, is heavy on improvisation.

hearing that there was section drawing and context recording to be done I immediately volunteered to clean up and excavate the palisade feature as I’m far more comfortable with a trowel than with a pencil. Gigi, on the other hand, thought I really needed to get to grips with section drawing. He was right. Under his excellent tutelage I ended the day with a passable section drawing of the ditch. While I was embroiled in measuring deposits, Lois and Caroline were attempting to unravel the mystery of the contexts and get them recorded on the PDA. At the less stressful end of the trench, Jamal trowelled away quite happily uncovering the palisade.